RECENT MARTYRS

St. Óscar Romero

Bl. Stanley Rother

Bl. Santiago Miller

Martyrdom “is the sign that we are on Jesus’ path; it’s a
blessing from the Lord that within the people of God there is someone who gives
this witness of martyrdom,” he said Dec. 11 during his weekly general audience
in the Vatican’s Paul VI hall, which was decorated with a large Christmas tree
and Nativity scene. Blessed Santiago Miller, a U.S.-born religious brother who
was martyred in Guatemala in 1982, had just been beatified the previous Saturday.

The pope continued his series of talks on the Acts of the Apostles by looking at the increasing amount of suffering and persecution the Apostle Paul faced as he spread the Gospel.

“Paul is not just an evangelizer filled with passion, the
intrepid missionary among pagans who brings new Christian communities to life,
he is also a suffering witness of the Risen One,” the pope said in his
catechesis.

Much like Jesus, Paul faced fierce persecution in Jerusalem,
and he was put in chains following his arrest on charges of preaching against
the law and the temple.

While most people saw his chains as a sign of him being a
criminal, the pope said, Paul saw the chains with “the eyes of faith” as a sign
of his love for Jesus.

“For Paul, his faith is not a theory, an opinion about God
and the world, but it is the impact of God’s love in his heart, it is love for
Jesus Christ,” he said.

“Paul teaches us perseverance amid trials and the ability to
see everything with the eyes of faith,” the pope said. “Let us ask the Lord
today, through the apostle’s intercession, to rekindle our faith and help us be
completely faithful to our vocation as Christians, as disciples of the Lord, as
missionaries.”

Pope Francis poses with members of the Great Moscow State Circus during his general audience in Paul VI hall at the Vatican Dec. 11, 2019. During his audience, he acknowledged the many Eastern European Catholics who had risked their lives for their faith under communist rule. (Paul Haring/CNS)

To further underline how, even in modern times, Christians
still face suffering and persecution, the pope spoke about meeting with
pilgrims from Ukraine earlier that morning.

He explained how Eastern-rite Catholics in Ukraine had been
persecuted for their faith under communism, “but they did not negotiate the
faith.”

Pope Francis greets a group of Catholics from Chihuahua, Mexico, during his general audience in Paul VI hall at the Vatican Dec. 11, 2019. The group came to Rome to celebrate the Dec. 12 feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. (Paul Haring/CNS)

“In the world today, including in Europe, many Christians are
being persecuted. And they give their life for their faith,” he said.

“They are persecuted with ‘white gloves,’ that is, they are
pushed aside, emarginated,” the pope said. “Martyrdom is the context of a
Christian, of a Christian community. There always will be martyrs among us.”

The group of pilgrims that met with Pope Francis included
bishops, priests, religious and laypeople from the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy
of Mukachevo, which was celebrating the 30th anniversary of no longer having to
practice the faith clandestinely under Soviet oppression.

The pope told them that their Church “is the mother of many
martyrs,” recalling the example of their bishop, Blessed Theodore Romzha, who
was killed by the Soviet secret police in 1947 and who was beatified as a
martyr by St. John Paul II in 2001.

“In the darkest hours of your history,” Pope Francis said,
“he knew how to guide the people of God with evangelical wisdom and courage, a
tireless man,” who, like Christ the Good Shepherd, gave his life for his flock,
the pope said.

Pope Francis noted that many of the pilgrims’ own relatives
had to risk their freedom or life in order to hand down the “teaching of the
truth of Christ” to them and future generations.

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